[pct-l] marmot driclime & sonoma outfitters

[Trekker4 at aol.com (Trekker4@aol.com)]

Here's my bad experience, as promised; this is sent  to S O also for their 
info. A while back, Yogi posted that the Driclime was on  sale at Sonoma 
Outfitters for $50; the list price is $100. This was a damn good  price; however, I 
wasn't sure I wanted one, and had already spent a lot of money  in January - 
hundreds of $ to lighten my pack.
    Later I decided to go ahead and get one; going  through the order process 
the shipping came out as $9, a bit high I  thought, but nothing I could do 
anything about. I decided to add a couple  Platypus bottles I wanted, a 1 ltr & 
a 2 ltr; the shipping jumped to $17, a  big time rip off for 3 oz of weight 
the could be shipped first class mail for  way under $2. Also the bottles are 
flat and could be put in the same box with no  strain; and I do realize the 
computer doesn't know this.
    I deleted the Platypus bottles, and almost canceled  the whole order. I 
changed my mind again and went ahead and ordered the  Driclime. The acceptance 
email said 25 Jan @ 8:28 AM CST. After that I  emailed an man specifically 
named on their site, complained about the shipping  charge rip off, and told him 
he could add the 2 bottles for the same shipping if  he wanted to; he's still 
never answered my email, pretty poor for someone who  personally solicits 
input on a website. About 11 hours later an email  stamped 7:34 PM stated that the 
item was out of stock, would not be  backordered, and the card wouldn't be 
charged; to be fair their site says this  is what will happen if something is 
backordered. 
    However, no other website I've ever dealt with does  that. They always 
backorder and honor something they put on the site; basically  everyone else 
removes out of stock items from a site immediately. Sonoma  Outfitters DOES NOT 
RUN AN HONEST SITE. The size and only color available  was still there the next 
day, the 26th; I tried the order again, just out of  curiosity; almost 14 
hours later the out of stock email was sent. I just  checked again; the item is 
now removed, but it was still there yesterday, the  27th. 
    This smacks of a classic "bait and switch"  operation to me, or a poorly 
run business at best. The lack of backordering  an advertised item, listed as 
available; the lack of a response to solicited  email; and the rip off 
shipping charges --- lead me to advise DON'T SO  BUSINESS WITH SONOMA OUTFITTERS. 
I'll be adding my "rating" to the sites  that rate online "stores" also. Maybe 
I'm out of line, but I'd never  run into any of this with any other online 
retailer.  
 
Bob 
Big  Bend Desert Denizen
(Naturalized Citizen, Republic of  Texas)